“The Chase is arguably Penn's most powerful film. The contemporary setting; the social, political, and economic relevance; the sexual tensions; the extreme violence; and the sense of power gone wild are all particularly potent themes for today's audiences. An escaped convict (Robert Redford) heads back to his Texas home town and wife (Jane Fonda). The local sheriff (Marlon Brando) expects trouble and gets it. The town's oil baron (E. G. Marshall) and his son (James Fox) have vested interests in Redford's fate. Mob violence takes over and all becomes chaos.
“Because of post-production feuding, it has been difficult to tell just how closely The Chase resembles Penn's vision of it. But all his most familiar themes are present--in highly charged form. The populace is constituted out of multiple layers of alienated and pathetic figures. It seems as if Penn, or screenwriter Lillian Hellman, is saying that ‘everyone is someone's outcast.' Brando, in one of his most consistently controlled performances, epitomizes the force of maturity aligned against raw and infantile explosiveness. The attempt at wisdom is sincere, but the effect is nil.... (One) of The Chase's strongest ideas (is that,) though violence is cathartic, it is also useless since the source of the violence (sexual repression, economic fears and insecurities, unresolved fantasy/reality dichotomies) still exists.” Eric Sherman